Third, Clarke is hard-working and unpaid. Should critics pull their punches on this account? On the contrary, in allowing so much power to settle into an unpaid portfolio, the ECB's corporate structure is looking increasingly bizarre. In most businesses of our size, the chief executive provides the capitalist vigour, while the chairman provides the brakes. In our set-up, the chairman has the big ideas, cuts the deals and then fronts them to the media while the chief executive...well, it's hard to see where David Collier comes into the picture, except as dancer-in-chief at Stanford's reggae shindig. 

But a serious lesson may yet be learnt from the Stanford disaster. It demonstrates the sad spectacle of being on the wrong side of history. Leaving aside the subsequent alleged fraud, the tournament's whole atmosphere suggested the fag end of a profligate age, a fin de siècle of cheerleaders and bad logos. 

Stanford liked to compare himself with the Australian tycoon Kerry Packer, who invented night cricket, split the world game and gave the old boys' networks a massive kick in the backside. When Packer began one meeting with the cricket bosses with the refrain, "Come on, we're all whores, name your price," a shiver of excitement must have shot down the sport's collective spine. Yes, he was vulgar - but also bold and invigorating.